I Will No Longer Say Nothing

Now that my comics are being posted in several different forums, they have come to the attention of Those That Say Negative Things. As a victim of bullying in his youth and a man living with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, I can probably say that I feel the negativity presented by others a little more than the average person.

When I was bullied in Junior High and High School, the only words of advice given to me at the time were “ignore it.” Yes, people tend to think that if you ignore it, it will go away, but it doesn’t. It’s like a chronic pain in your shoulder. Your body is telling you that something is wrong and that you should go to a doctor. If you ignore it, it may go away for a little while, but it can end up becoming even worse back pain or causing you to lose feeling in your entire arm. If I ignored the bullying the first time it happened, it would have gone away from -me-. The next thing I would have seen is some other nerdy kid being shoved into a locker. Ignore it and it will go away, but it won’t stop.

It is time to stop it. I will not back down. I will no longer say nothing.

Here is my first action, a response to Those That Say Negative Things:

@[user name removed]- I apologize for taking so long to get back to your comment (and your comments on my previous entry) in My Journal here on [website removed]. I was going to follow the advice of “Don’t Feed the Trolls,” but decided that I should say something before you could continue on what I believe is your current path of anonymously posting hateful comments and not realizing that you are targeting -real- people. These people have real thoughts and feelings, just like you.

I love comics and sequential art. I make them because it is what I was meant to do. Like most artists (even though most won’t admit it), I also love hearing what people think about my work, especially if it is constructive criticism. What you’re doing (calling my comic a “trainwreck”, saying that it’s “so bad”) is not constructive, it is destructive. It is also considered a behavior used by bullies and it is not cool. I doubt you would seriously say those things to me in person.

To put it in context, what you just did was walk by my table at a busy comic convention, spit on my portfolio, and then stare me in the eye.

To tell you the truth, I wasn’t surprised by your comments at all. I hear that stuff ALL the time, but 99.9% of it is coming from my own brain. I am the biggest critic of my own work, hands down. Nothing you can say about my writing or drawing will even come close to what I’ve said about it to myself.

Now, if you are smart, you will not see this as a challenge for you to prove me wrong. This is not an invitation to post the most vile and hurtful things you can think to type. No, this is a challenge for you to cease your destructive and hateful comments, to stop bullying people, and to become a better person. It is a challenge to join with the rest of the human race who are capable of kindness and empathy.

Come and help us continue build a place where we are all comfortable to live in our own skin and where we can share our art without the fear of violent, uncompromising rejection from our peers.

Robert, they are themselves insecure fools, if they have to take the time to insult you then it is just to make themselves feel better. I know that it can be a weight on your soul but if they have to find satisfaction in there lives by insulting another then they are not even worth pity. You have a great comic. Thank you for being you.

I took no offense to anything they said. All I did was ask the one person who had said something negative at three separate times to explain why they thought my comic was a trainwreck.
What was the first thing they did? Not read my entire comment and then run to their friends to complain about me. Most of the commenting was done by the other people.
I took none of it personally and consider it a victory that some of them actually read through my entire archive.

It always astounds my that people are incapable of appreciating art in it’s many forms. If you don’t like something you don’t need to leave a comment at all.

Prove yourself by doing better or being more successful at the same thing you’re baging out or just shut up. The artist isn’t hurting you, the artist isn’t making you look at his work, so just walk away and find something better to do with your life.

One guy was saying that he read through the entire archive, didn’t like any of it, didn’t want to talk to me about why he hated it, and then proceeded to tell me why he didn’t like it. Weird.
Thanks for the page views, dude!

What you are doing is assuming the best of someone by acting as though they will want to behave differently if they think about what they are doing. And it was certainly more constructive than carrying the communication away with you to be dumped on some unsuspecting loved one.

Hi! Since english is not my maternal language, please excuse me if I make some mistakes… Just to let you know that I discovered your work for the first time about 7 years ago on the webzine morbid outlook where your comic Writhe and Shine was featured, and I really liked it. But years after, I rediscovered your work with your new comic and I just love it! I’m so glad to had come across your website Every week I’m looking for the next strip. Thank you for sharing your work with us!
A hello from France,
Lina

Your comics are wonderful! Please don’t let people with bad taste get you down. I know it really isn’t that simple but I just wanted to put it out there. I kinda have a basic understanding of how PTSD works. My Bf has it and it not as simple as ” don’t let it bother you.” You just keep doing your thing and we’ll keep supporting you ^.^

Much better than anything I would have said (Possibly along the lines of “Eat shite and die you worthless piece of sickening medical waste!”).

Robert man, I don’t just love what you do, I honestly like who you are. I wish I could meet you in person at some point (and I mean this in a totally sane non-stalker way with full respect for your personal space).

You keep doing what you’re doing bud, and dinnae let the bastards drag you down!

I’m not sure if it helps at all, but… “ignore it” is not life advice. It has to do with school administration. Ignore the bullies enough, and they’ll switch from words to violence, which the school can deal with without it turning into “he said, she said”.

Some people just want to feel special or important, so they spout off about how bad THEY feel something is in the hopes that others will pay attention to them.

Most likely the only way they got any attention as children was to be bad, any attention is better than no attention, so that is how they learned to relate to the world even as adults.

“If I act out, someone will pay attention to me, doesn’t matter if they love me or hate me, they will pay attention.”

For a very brief time they will be the center of a sad little universe, they just don’t realize that the only one’s that they are actually hurting is themselves. They most likely don’t have anyone that truly cares enough about them to sit them down and explain that if they really want love, they should stop being a jackass who tears people down and try being someone who try’s to help build people up.

Internet trolls are assholes who have been *TAUGHT* that the only way for them to get any attention is to be an asshole.